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EY has begun monitoring UK employees’ attendance at work, with swipe card entry data being circulated to senior levels at the company as some employees breach hybrid working guidelines.
In recent weeks, some partners at Big Four firms have been shown anonymized “turnstile access” data that shows how often their employees are in the office, company officials told Financial.com.・Told the Times.
One official said the statistics would be used by some in the business as a “carrot rather than a stick” to influence teams to comply with EY’s hybrid working guidelines. He added that some teams are failing to meet their policy of at least 50 percent of their teams being in the office at least two days a week.
The move highlights how major employers are grappling with office attendance rates after moving to hybrid work arrangements during the coronavirus pandemic.
Bank of America has sent “education letters” to U.S. employees who don’t come into the office, while in the U.K., Citigroup has been asking employees in recent months whether they’re coming into the office at least three days a day. I was told that I would start checking. week. Lloyds Banking Group and HSBC UK have also announced stricter flexible working policies.
Some business executives, including the UK head of EY rival PwC, are becoming increasingly vocal about the importance of staff coming into the office. In a survey conducted by KPMG in October, more than 80% of company bosses said they were more likely to reward employees who came to work more regularly with better assignments, raises, promotions, etc.
Some partners at EY, which employs about 21,000 people in the U.K., were also shown analysis that correlated attendance numbers with mid-year performance reviews, one of the people said.
In October, the company made a “material update” to its Human Resources Privacy Notice detailing how it processes employees’ personal information, according to a message obtained by the FT.
Staff said the update includes “changes to the collection and further processing” of swipe card entry data in offices, which will allow EY to “…
EY declined to comment on the collection or use of swipe card data.
A person familiar with the matter said EY does not have a “company-wide policy” on using swipe card data to influence workplace attendance.
Separately, EY continues to furlough staff in the UK, with at least 64 more employees being put at risk of redundancy this month, people familiar with the matter said. This is on top of a total of 300 job cuts last year.
The company added that it had started a voluntary redundancy scheme for 40 employees in its customer consulting division and a compulsory redundancy scheme for 24 employees in its financial services legal advisory services team.
EY said: “We continually assess the resource needs of our operations and some of our organizations are discussing proposals to align current resource requirements with market demand.”
